United Kingdom

Status of International legal instruments protecting the right to food and nutrition (signatory, ratification):

  • International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights - 16th Sept 1968 - 20th May 1976
  • Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women - 22nd July 1981 - 7th April 1986
  • International Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination - 11th Oct 1966 - 7th March 1969
  • Convention on the Rights of the Child - 19th Apr 1990 - 16th Dec 1991
  • ILO Convention concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples in Independent Countries (169) - Not Ratified
  • United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples 

For more information visit the website of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR)  

RELATED MEDIA

19/10/2020

Amid Covid-19 resurgence, lockdowns in Europe, group urges UK education chief to extend free school meals

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The resurgence of Covid-19 in Europe is expected to cause more local lockdowns and the worsening of hunger and poverty among the continent’s most impoverished, including millions of children in the United Kingdom. Amid the October school break and the coming Christmas holidays, these children will likely suffer from starvation as calls for the government to extend free school meals continue to fall on deaf ears.  

 

REPORTS

INDICATORS

  • Non discrimination

  • Outcomes

    • To what extent are rural communities shrinking


      % of population living in rural areas       Read more

      17%

  • People’s Sovereignty over natural resources

    • Are there Intellectual Property Rights on seeds?

      Read more

      Privatized varieties may be used to breed new ones.

    • Laws protecting industrial seeds

      Read more

      Privatized Seeds

      • Can harvest them again on their own farm with restrictions
      • Can’t harvest and exchange them/ give them as a gift
      • Can’t sell them
      • Restriction of these seeds may be set by contract
      • Farmers can only buy certified, registered or catalogued seeds

       

      Difficult to access non industrial seeds

      • Using loopholes to force a law to change
      • Mainly in relation to the acquisition of cereals.
      • These loophole schemes→ they can license rather than sell seeds.

    • Pesticide use by volume and by expenditure

      Read more

      Fungicides and Bactericides:5842.96

      Herbicides: 7676.52

      Insecticides: 716.54 

      There was a steep plunge in the usage of fungicides in 2005.

       

  • Political Participation for the Right to Food

    Participation is one of the fundamental human rights principles, requiring that everyone has the right to participate in making decisions that affect them. In order to ensure that those most affected by violations to the right to food and nutrition participate in political processes, it is essential to have the legal and policy infrastructure within national frameworks, as well as the participatory spaces that give meaningful space for participation.

    • Legal Recognition of the Right to Food and Nutrition


      Is Right to Food recognized in the legal system       Read more

      Does not explicitly guarantee the right to adequate food.

    • National Food Security Policy


      Is there a national food security policy with implementation/action?       Read more

      Food Security paper by the house of commons published in 2012. [1]

      State of British government on food security. Freer trade rather than subsidy for domestic production. 

       

      Strategy for Sustainable Farming and Food

       

       

      [1] https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-for-environment-f...